EHF Cup rights picked up by DAZN in Germany and Austria

DAZN, the OTT subscription broadcaster, has acquired rights in Germany and Austria to broadcast the EHF Cup, European handball’s secondary clubs competition, in a two-year agreement.

EHF Marketing, the in-house commercial arm of the European Handball Federation, has announced a deal that allows DAZN to show all group-stage games (home and away) featuring German teams, plus selected other games and the EHF Cup Finals (the semi-finals, third-place playoff and final).

The deal kicks in with the start of the group phase in February.

Sky Deutschland, the German pay-TV broadcaster, holds the exclusive rights in Germany and Austria to the top-tier Velux EHF Champions League until 2020.

THW Kiel, Füchse Berlin and TSV Hannover-Burgdorf are the three German sides to have qualified for the EHF Cup group stages, the draw for which was made today at the EHF’s Vienna headquarters.

David Szlezak, EHF Marketing’s managing director, remarked: “With three German teams in the group phase, and with Füchse Berlin as defending champions, the Men’s EHF Cup has a significant following on the German market.”

He said that the deal with DAZN “introduces our competition to an innovative, revolutionary, multi-sport streaming service, which already has millions of subscribers across seven markets.”

MDR, the regional public broadcaster in Germany, showed last season’s EHF Cup semi-final between SC Magdeburg and France’s Saint Raphael. The all-German semi-final between Füchse Berlin and Frisch Auf! Göppingen was aired by Berlin’s RBB. Both MDR and RBB showed the final live.

International broadcast rights to the EHF club competitions were previously sold by MP & Silva but EHF Marketing took back control of the rights after terminating its agreement with the agency, given missed instalment payments.

Given that the MP & Silva agreement was not a full rights buyout and contracts with broadcasters were signed off by EHF Marketing, the federation’s commercial arm was able to maintain the TV contracts and had been collecting the fees due for the 2018-19 season in order to be able to pay prize money and meet organisational and staff costs.

The MP & Silva contract was due to run until 2020, after which Infront and DAZN Group will sell the rights as part of a wide-ranging agreement with the EHF.

SN1 Consulting, the Munich-based boutique media rights consultancy, has been working with EHF Marketing in an advisory capacity to sell media rights to the EHF’s club competitions for the next two seasons. Indeed, SN1 Consulting recently appointed handball rights expert Ulrich Gutweniger, previously head of media at EHF Marketing, from MP & Silva.

• The EHF and Infront, its media and sponsorship rights distributor for the sport’s European Championships, have introduced various digital activations at the women’s EHF Euro, which begins in France tonight.

The EHF said: “For the first time the EHF will be able to instantly generate and distribute professionally edited videos on a large scale using artificial intelligence with the introduction of [Israeli] start-up WSC Sports. This content, along with short-form and behind-the-scenes videos, will also be shared with the new EHF influencer network, expanding the reach beyond EHF's owned channels.”

Along with the official website (www.ehf-euro.com), supporters can also follow the action on a new tournament app that includes key information, live scores, match action and multiple fan engagement tools.

Julien Ternisien, Infront’s senior vice-president of summer sports said: "Our commitment to handball and the EHF was made clear with the extension of our agreement earlier this year to 2030, and we were keen to begin working alongside the federation on taking the sport to the next level as soon as possible.

"This is the first opportunity for us to really show how we want to positively impact the sport and bring the tournament to the fans through both traditional and digital mediums. I'm delighted that we are able to work with the EHF on these exciting initiatives."

Meanwhile, broadcast rights to the tournament have been distributed to over 65 broadcasters in more than 135 countries (a list of rights-holding broadcasters can be found here). All games will also be streamed live and on-demand on the EHF’s ehfTV.com platform.